Any hopes City may have had of landing Daniele de Rossi from Roma in the January transfer window have been dashed by the Italian club’s president James Pallotta.

Any hopes City may have had of landing Daniele de Rossi from Roma in the January transfer window have been dashed by the Italian club’s president James Pallotta.

City boss Roberto Mancini has been a long-time admirer of the Italy midfielder, who re-awakened City interest by falling out of favour at his club this season and arguing with coach Zdenek Zeman.

But Pallotta poured cold water on renewed transfer talk, saying: “We have absolutely no intention of selling De Rossi. We have not had any contact from anyone and we have not received any offers. It is just speculation.”

The Blues, however, could be reluctant to splash out in January anyway after the Premier League yesterday moved a step closer to introducing spending controls – dispite City’s objection to the move.

The chairmen of the 20 top-flight teams have agreed in principle that all clubs must break even.

It is understood the Blues, who last week became the first club to announce that their annual wage bill has topped the £200m mark as they announced an annual loss of £97.9m, were one of three clubs to oppose the move, along with Fulham and Aston Villa. However, only 14 need to agree for the move to go through.Vincent Kompany back for Blues boost

Exact details of the spending controls have yet to be agreed – specifically around how much wealthy owners can put into the club to cover losses.

The club chairmen have now asked Premier League executives to bring back detailed plans on the spending controls for the next meeting on February 6, and on proposals to cap wage rises for players in the short-term.

United and Arsenal have been pushing for a pure break-even system similar to UEFA’s financial fair play scheme for clubs in European competition.

A group of other clubs, including Wigan and Chelsea, are also in favour of a break- even system, but argue that wealthy benefactors should be permitted to put extra investment into clubs.

The sticking point to any agreement is how much investment should be allowed, but the majority of clubs are agreed that this should only be in the form of equity and not loans.

The issue of wage control for players has also received broad support from the chairmen but again the details has yet to be agreed.

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